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What Features Should Be Included With iPhone 3.0?
With the announcement coming tomorrow, Macworld has posted their top list of 15 features they would like to see in an iPhone 3.0 update. The list includes some things that people have been asking for since launch (like cut and paste) and things that were once there but have since been silently removed (like push notifications/background apps). With almost 2 years of time to grow and learn, what other things are woefully inadequate on Apple's popular handheld?
... a keyboard?
Most Asked for Feature that Will Never Be Implimented on an Apple Product: Removing the DRM.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Should be top of the list.
"So is the BSD licence even more 'free' (than GPLv2)? Yes. Unquestionably." --Linus Torvalds (TinyURL.com/2vugzl)
unlimited porn subscription
-Standard USB data/charging cable
-USB mass storage support
-Video recording
-Tethering
-Multitasking
-MMS
I'd like to second the desire for copy-and-paste; it's the thing that has really been bugging me since I got an iPhone.
Being able to sync with Thunderbird, without having to do the "Thunderbird sync to Google, iPod sync to Google" thing would be nice. If they could add support for syncing calendars with Sunbird at the same time, that would be spiffing.
Yeah, I had a sig once; I got bored of it.
The iPhone has quite a few otherwise great apps (like IM clients and such) that don't get used much because they can't run in the background. AIM or Yahoo IM aren't much use to me if, in order to stay connected to the IM service, the phone has to have that app running in the foreground at all times. Seriously, add multitasking. Let users answer texts or change the current song while still running another application in the background.
How about letting me use something other than AT&FT? No? Then I don't care what shiny new items are on your feature list.
[b.belong('us') for b in bases if b.owner() == 'you']
The Apple music store is DRM free now.
Are you proposing they remove the DRM support in hardware, so people who bought DRM'd media can't play those files?
Or are you just bitching about something that's sure to get a bunch of other putzes to agree with you?
The current (legal) ones really tie your hands.
The ATT service is OK in Vermont other than the price, however there is no 3G (yet).
... a keyboard?
I think they should include a printer as well, one which prints out money! That way, the owners might have some way of recouping the cost of a ridiculously overpriced telephone/mp3 player!
On a more serious note. They should include proper buttons for skipping tracks and and changing albums. Whilst the touch screen might look all fancy, it's not very useful when you're walking down a crowded street and just want to stick your hand in your pocket and skip to the next track.
I personally use an MP3 player which doesn't have a screen at all. I don't need one. I don't need to be able to see what tune I'm playing, I can hear which one it is! Maybe with the crappy earphones you get on an iPhone it's harder to hear what tune is playing!
On that note, they really need to include that 8A83E3 chip so we can't accidentally plug in a competitor's earphones and be hindered by superior sound quality! :)
Not around here it doesn't. If you want suckage talk to Sprint or T-Mobile.
Not just because it's absolutely awesome to download horror films in a field somewhere and watch them on a real screen, but because it would force mobile phone service providers to offer it as a consumerland option. It beats the hell out of a seperate USB-stick mobile broadband package, even at £5 extra per month. And it would mean that you finally have a mobile broadband option for your Macbook.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Google Maps on the phone is useless for actually getting somewhere. It draws a nice line but without turn by turn navigation or even detecting when you're off the path and re-calculating it's no good for driving.
I know it says it's not meant for that but that strikes me as trying to cover up being inadequate with some after the fact documentation and legalese.
No contracts to buy one would be number one on my list
Your other choice would be T-Mobile, which has crappier service than ATT. Anything else would require a significant redesign of the product.*
*yes, I'm aware there are other, smaller GSM carriers in the US; realistically speaking, you're still tied to ATT or T-Mobile for most population centers in the US.
-Ability to use as a modem (via bluetooth and USB or even ad-hoc WiFi).
How about the next version include less smugness?
Sent from my iPhone
I'm much more interested in what flavors iPhone pi will come in.
Yeah, I know it's only a minor update to the 3.x series but I'm hoping for strawberry.
We already know what shape it will be. Pi r round.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
This one drives me nuts. My life is conf calls yet when a call number in included in a meeting invite, IT'S NOT LINKED like phone number are EVERYWHERE else in the phone apps.
It has IPSEC and a couple of others. I want OpenSSL.
would be a way for the apple software to prevent people from posting "First" comments on any website via the iPhone.
-- All this knowledge is giving me a raging brainer.
which can be activated remotely by sending "666" to the phone.
-jX
Don't you just love politics? It's like a comedy of errors.
Voice Dialing is one of the feature that is listed. I do not have iPhone, I thought VD was a standard feature on the phones coming out today. The phone I have was bought in 2006 (Motorola razr), even this dinky phone has voice dialing. I cannot believe people stood in line to buy a iPhone that do not even offer voice dialing for that hefty price?
The iphone is awesome and I want one but it's still a walled garden so I'm avoiding it. Here's a perfect example:
http://appstorehell.chocoflop.com/wiki/Main_Page
What the hell is wrong with my iPhone / iPod application and why do I not get any answers after months of waiting ?
So you got an iPhone and thought it was a great device and you decided to write software for it:
* You learned objective-C and Cocoa programming
* You paid 99$ to register as an official developer
* You wrote a nice application
* You submitted your application.
* and then...
Image:mail.png It doesn't get rejected, but you get a message that says...
Your application YourApp is requiring unexpected additional time for review. We apologize for the delay, and will update you with further status as soon as we are able. Thank you for your patience.
Looks like nothing to worry about. So...
* You wait for a week, then two, then three, four, five, six...
* You write e-mails to devprograms
* You make phone calls to developer support
But you never get any answer ? After a pair of months you get used to the idea that your app will never be accepted nor rejected.
Image:question.png So what is happening really ?
Knowningly or not you most likely hit on one of the "secretly forbidden" features that Apple doesn't want on the AppStore. Those are issues that are not specifically mentionned in the agreement and that they are not willing to defend. Their solution, which is unofficial but which has proven to be systematic is to let developers linger in silence for ever.
It's a cool technology but Apple's engaging in superdickery here, same as the American cell carriers. Apple had to use their clout to get unmetered broadband from ATT but cheering them on for that feels kind of like WWIII Ukrainians cheering on the nazis for pushing out the communists.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
The lowest price you can get an iPhone contract for in the US is $US70 per month. My cousin in Australia has her iPhone contract for $AUD58 per month.
And I have seen posters in Australia advertising pre-paid iPhones.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
A choice of any bandwidth provider out there?
I can't believe nobody has mentioned this yet. It plagues everyone I know who bought one of these stupid things thinking that Exchange support meant WORKING Exchange support.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
full source code like You get with Android?
Agreed. AT&T service is pointless in PA/NJ.
Nice feature when listening to music (Pandora), you can hear an incoming call and you can answer it. However there is no setting to return to automatically return to the music, or at least re-launch whatever app you were using before the call came in. Also while the headphones with the built in mic is awesome (no need to unplug headphones when answering a call), it would be much cooler if there was voice activated answering, so you don't have to pull your phone out to answer the call. Along with that, voice announced caller ID (again so you don't have to pull your phone out) (Panasonic has it on their land line phones).
Please, deliver on your promise and fix the app notifications you've announced when the first SDK shipped. There are so many great applications out there that would get a much needed enhancement - IM, GTD apps, Email, etc.
My #1 request is push email that doesn't involve Yahoo, Mail2Web, or Me.com
If so, that's some pretty impressive software.
Best Slashdot Co
Working just fine here in Northeast PA. I was a Verizon fanboi until recently, but I haven't had a single issue with AT&T so far.
Self-destruct.
For a start when I put two xx's at the end of a message to a close friend, don't replace it with Fx. Oh and when I write out cunt, I mean to, so don't go sweetening it for me (same for other swears).
Deathray.
A rotary dialer
Linux.
MMS. Actual take-a-picture-and-send-it-to-another-phone MMS. Not this half-assed email attachment crap.
Not everyone in my life wants to check email on their phone, even if they had the capability. But everyone, including my grandmother, texts and uses MMS.
Encryption!
In my view, Cut-N-Paste, MMS, A2DP and other such features are point items to be added to a stable release. They do not justify upping the major release number. And Apple has been fairly logical about release numbering if you look at OS X. You need something really major to update the release number, possibly something that changes the entire framework.
So with that view, here's my list:
1) Background apps and/or push notifications: Its fairly obvious why this hasn't happened yet. AT&T. Enable push notifications and AT&T's revenue from SMS/texting goes down in a major way as everyone starts using their favorite instant messenger. Not sure how Apple will handle this, but I wouldn't be surprised if push notifications came with a tax/twist of some sort.
2) Mobile Me As an Application Platform: This would work wonderfully with Apple's approach to integrating hardware, software and services to enable a better user experience. Push notifications could be channeled through Mobile Me. In essence open up Mobile Me as an application platform for creating cloud based apps for the iphone. This would also enable syncing for non-apple applications which in my view is a major hole today. Additionally, this ups the ante by an order of magnitude beyond what the other phone vendors can offer. (expect perhaps Google and Android) It could also spur Mac sales if some parts of the Mobile Me integration are Mac only.
I am fairly certain (2) will happen. Whether its tomorrow or later I don't know but I hope tomorrow.
Keys so I dont need to stare on the screen to type, compatibility with standard headphones, a FM radio receiver, user replacable battery, MMS, decent camera, camera for video calls, freedom to use the provider I want, ...
Oh wait, there are dozens of other mobile phones that have all that for less cost.
Nevermind then.
You can start to think about it, but you won't ever finish, because Bluetooth is just plain too slow for that.
It should be able to sync over 802.11 though. From your pocket. With no user interaction. Finding your computer with Rendezvous.... Mmmm...
When reading through this list, I am amazed at all ofthe things people want that are already available as a free app Voice dialing landscape typing Auto Correct Spelling ...
I guess one thing they could add is "Clippy" for the people who dont want to read the instructions.
We've got an entire company of these things, and no one seems to complain about exchange support.
I personally have one as well, and I have yet to have a problem with it.
-ted
Just copy and paste it, problem solved! oh wait...
never mind.
Most of this list matches the top items on www.pleasefixtheiphone.com.
Now for the flame bait: Most of these features are on the latest BlackBerries.
AT&T sucks. It's why I won't buy an iPhone.
Fixed.
what you get when you include all these things into iPhoneOS 3.0 is exactly what we already have with Windows Mobile 6.1, and it works brilliantly, without bugs, without crashes, and, the entire thing is open and fully documented.
portfolio
Steve hates fans and keeps them out of this toasters, oops, computers.
Maybe one of the 25K apps simulates the sound of a fan.
Yes! The audio A2DP Bluetooth profile has been such an obvious omission. Car stereos and headphones are ready and waiting for iPhone to catch up here.
Computers obey me.
Done
1. A more complete bluetooth stack that does OBEX and A2DP and Syncing.
2. an IChat client.
3. A side swipe like the one in Mail and SMS to delete individual calls from the recents List.
4. Notes Sync with the Desktop.
5. Voice Dialing (ala Voice Commmand on Winmo) would be nice.
Do not read this
A program to make free long distance phone calls whenever you want. It may come in more handy on the iPod touch than a iPhone, which would be redundant.
until i can afford a data plan worth mentioning in Canada... Nothing!
USA is sans DRM. Canada is not. Nor is europe.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
are the two most important features, to me, for any smartphone. I haven't yet found them. My last phone, a WinMobile 6.0 monster, is 1- dead after 2 weeks 2- required 2 hands to use... and really felt like it would have loved to have a keyboard... For making phone calls and adresse book lookups...
Stop it with the featuritis. Do less. Do it better.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
How about being 'Unlocked' as a feature?
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
How about the ability for web applications, flash/flex applications and java applications to run off of its web browser?
Well, that is a workaround
No, a workaround is something you have to do in order to do something the product was not designed to do.
The App Store was designed to work with all of the products you might own, so being able to use the apps on multiple devices is not a "workaround", it's by design.
Stripping out the DRM to give free apps to others is a "workaround"
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Perhaps DRM encompasses this, but I'd like to see the device opened up a bit more itself. Being able to use it with something else other than iTunes (Songbird, for example) would be really nice.
As we all know though, that isn't going to happen.
Fact: Everything I say is fiction.
Aka recents. You can't even tell how long an individual call lasted with the current implementation.
Right now, it defaults to once, and if you don't unlock the phone, it does it again. I'd like to set it just to once ... period. I figure if they allow you to set it to once, why not to X with some suitable max value.
But I'd settle for once. I get a lot of texts while in meetings, and I don't need the confusing second notification in there making me think I got another. Right now, I just glance at the screen and see what's there without unlocking--it's annoying when I see it's the same text from before.
"Doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs." -- Switchfoot, Ode to Chin
Oh I would add to this the ability to change the default routes by dragging the "line".
Actually, most people don't seem to have realized this, but the mic on Apple's default white headset works for this. One squeeze pauses the current track, a double squeeze is equivalent to "Next", and 3 squeezes is "Previous". That was a lifesaver during the winter when I had no desire to take off my gloves. It's also the reason I haven't felt the need to get better headphones.
I think it's absurd to claim that the utter hack that is MMS is a "better" way to send photos than email. On phones where I had MMS I never used it, email is far superior because the person will either get the email on the phone (that supports proper email) or at home, I only have to send it once.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
- Support for ics calendar files in Mail.app
- More Bluetooth functions, like sending contacts to other phones via bluetooth, or being able to interact with other peripherals
- Support for unlocking functions, like many other sane GSM phones. I want to use my AT&T sim card in the US, but I'm locked to my Rogers SIM in Canada.
I know right now they have this one connection that they send push notifications down. I'd love some way to attach my other mail servers to that channel.
I'm not expecting to see that any time (if ever), but man, that would completely and utterly rock. I could hook my work Zimbra server into that channel and get instant notification of work email. I've gotten so used to MobileMe/.Mac being that way that it sucks having work be on a 15 minute refresh.
And yes, once you get used to it, you want to know immediately for all the rest of your email. Right now, I just set my phone to silent with vibrate off when I need privacy--then the phone just leaves me be during my DND times.
"Doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs." -- Switchfoot, Ode to Chin
In the dark, dank economic times ahead, we need weapons in the iPhone because its cheery and inviting glow will attract the unemployed proletariat riff-raff out on the streets.
I suggest a titanium telescoping katana that rotates into a Calabi Yau hyperspace manifold when not in use, or an iPhone app that opens a wormhole to a universe full of angry bees.
The ability to use a bluetooth keyboard. Would make having to sysadmin some shit while on a camping trip much easier.
I live in Central NJ and I couldn't agree more. I switched from Cingular to Verizon to AT&T over the past few years (I didn't switch to AT&T for the iPhone. I switched about a year ago for other reasons and when the 3G came out, I wanted to converge my music player and phone, so I got the 3G). I did notice more dropped calls after switching to the iPhone, but I did notice dropped calls in general after switching to AT&T. With Verizon, I never had a problem. I've yet to find a place where Verizon has no service and AT&T does BUT I know of a few places that Verizon has service and AT&T doesn't. When my contract is up (in just under 2 years... blarg), I wanna switch to Verizon and the Storm (or whatever phone may be out by then)
Whilst the touch screen might look all fancy, it's not very useful when you're walking down a crowded street and just want to stick your hand in your pocket and skip to the next track.
Ah, but how would they receive free marketing if you never pulled out your fancy device in a crowded area? People would not be able to woo as they watch you touch your phone and wish to themselves they had their own.
No doubt Apple realized that each time someone used it in a public setting it would be a conversation piece or at the very least get people to think to themselves, "Oh, hey, it's that one phone!", at least during the phone's initial debut. If people are simply pressing buttons, let alone out of the view of public, they lose some buzz.
There are people who are still in awe over the phone, however most of them have gone out and bought one themselves so that they can publicly display the phone themselves. This then becomes a situation of people simply displaying it publicly in hopes to look important or culturally elite, as no doubt all of us have seen quite more than we'd care to.
Prove it.
How about an SDK that works for Linux or Windows!!
A linux SDK would be ideal, because anyone with non-apple hardware can run it, and if they really want to develop for iphone they would install linux first or in a vm.
I'd settle for it behaving like a regular iPod. I could take my iPod to any computer and as long as that computer was authorized to play my iTunes purchases, I could play the music on it. This is not the case with the iPhone without doing a bit of hacking (not difficult, but I shouldn't have to do it)
How about being able to access the track description in the iPod app? The "best iPod" is lacking the most basic functionality of the first iPods.
Does anyone actually use their iPhone to list to podcasts? Why isn't anyone else complaining about this? Gee, I could listen to "NPR Fresh Air 03-09" or "NPR Fresh Air 03-10"... I think 09 sounds more interesting than 10 doesn't it? I'm sure glad I can't find out what it's actually about... because that might mess up the beauty of the interface somehow.
Arg!
Most of these points have already been made -- sync all your stuff, not just your email. Make everything searchable, not just contacts. Apple, PDAs have done this since before the turn of the century. Get on the stick.
Full bluetooth support. The i-phone should pair seamlessly with car audio systems that support stereo bluetooth. Blackberry already does this. Funky, proprietary cables and scratchy FM transmitters are so two decades ago.
Support for bluetooth peripherals, including (let me be clear on this) a decent keyboard. Blackberry already does this. Apple, you're missing out on a whole new line of stylish white iphone peripherals. Your marketing geeks should be thinking "micro-office".
Not just tethering, but bluetooth tethering. It's just amazing to me that you can tether a Blackberry to a Mac but you can't tether an i-phone to a Mac. How could Apple allow this to happen?
Speaking of proprietary cables, it's time Apple take a clue from the rest of the cell phone industry and switch to a micro-USB connector on the phone. Last time I said that in this forum, someone replied that Apple has been providing USB support for some time, which just goes to show how misunderstood this issue is. All three of our phones, and the company phone when I have to carry it, will charge from the same charger despite being different manufacturers. The ipod touch needs that proprietary stylish white charger with the stylish white proprietary connector. Where the hell has that thing gone now... Apple, please hear this. Proprietary data connectors are so last century.
MMS... geeze... don't get me started...
Apple has got to stop screwing around with locking down memory and calling it a feature. Flash memory is cheap, plentiful and standardized. A phone without a micro-SD slot is just plain not interesting. Why in God's name should you have to buy another phone to get more memory? How green is that? How financially responsible is that? Ipod and Iphone owners -- let me clue you in on a secret that Apples doesn't want you to know about... Memory has been cheap and more importantly, interchangeable for years. To upgrade my Blackberry from 8 Gbytes to 16 Gbytes costs $40.99 (Amazon) and can be done in a few seconds. To do a similar upgrade to an ipod touch is $284.95 (Amazon) minus whatever I could get on the used market for the old ipod. This is incredibly backwards. Flash memory is a commodity item.
I'm sure there are Apple marketing people who will say that locking down memory in iphone and ipod devices is a positive revenue stream for Apple. To them I say, the current arrangement results in a thriving used device market, from which you don't get revenue. Wouldn't you rather be selling stylish white SD cards at Apple's usual markup?
And finally, I won't even consider a phone that doesn't have a user replaceable battery. My phone is, like, my phone, it's what I use for my livelihood. I can't be without it for any longer than it takes to pop off the back and put in another battery. I'm sorry, if you're going to be a serious contender to serious phone/pda users, you're going to have to rethink this.
Again, I expect the next i-phone to be like the current 3G phone except more memory and a few bugfixes. What I hope happens is that Apple steps up to the plate and fields a phone that does everything the current competition does, only better. But -- reality check -- different isn't necessarily better. Example: Email is not a substitute for MMS. Email is Email, and MMS is MMS, and your competition has both.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
sometimes it's so slow to load up an app. Why is loading the phone app so slow, the calculator?
Invariably for the bundled iPhone apps, "back" is top left, and "forward" is top right.
I'd like to see all the apps amended to have a "back" button on their root screen to go back to the application menu. So many time I think back-back-back, then I can't go back anymore and have to hit the damn button.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
Additional Features:
1) Flash Player, especially since Adobe's been working on it and stating that it's more so a policy issue. (Policy is what seems to be blocking Flash, TomTom, multi-tasking, and more.)
2) Set WiFi alert time. I mean seriously, you drive through downtown and you can't even use your iPhone thanks to all the wifi alerts. That said, you'd still like to know if wifi is available when you're lounging around somewhere. Let us be able to set the following: a) Alert after 30 seconds of availability (this would eliminate the alerts popping up while driving), b) alert met to open/unlocked networks or ALL networks.
3) File transfer (let me be able to easily move files I want available locally on my iphone). And let me move files from other iTunes manually. Enable disk use (wireless and USB), USB a must and wireless a plus.
4) Dump iTunes. Seriously, talk about specification creep. When a music player now manages movies, television, that's one thing. But when it's your application manager and synchronization tool as well. Apple really needs to launch a new tool, call iLife or what not. Where iTunes would just be one category. I mean, I really hate having to go under music to find my TV shows and apps and such. LAME!!!
5) Ability to print basic text would be nice.
***
Like the Palm's Datebook, or my favorite Palm app from way back when - Iambic's Agendus.
Apple needs to make a single datastore available for this to work. The great thing about the various palm organizers was that they used the same data store, so that you could try out different apps without having to re-enter data or export/import.
I would love to make an appointment for my doctor/kids doctor/plumber by just looking the name up instead of having to type it.
-USB Support -Global Win95 .exe support
-Micro Projector with extra and easily replaceable bulb.
-Projector keyboard.
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
I'd like to see Android running on an iPhone-like piece of hardware.
I own an iPod Touch, and I'm not ever going to buy an iPhone or another Touch. The phone software itself is mediocre, but what really kills it for me is iTunes and Apple's un-productivity applications (Address Book, Calendar, and all that other crap).
I know you're being a bit sarcastic, but really... how long/why shouldn't an iPhone dock have a keyboard and display connectors.
With just a little more software and a display buffer an iPhone would be a perfectly workable workstation for the vast majority of people who use computers to browse the web and send e-mail and look at an occasional document. Just allowing users to access mobile.me would resolve much of the existing software limitations without actually writing any code.
Hell, with a bit of ram/electronics in the dock you could forgo the display buffer in the phone to drive a 24" display (presuming it isn't able to do so already).
Platform advocacy is like choosing a favorite severely developmentally disabled child.
These are in my priority list:
1. Copy/Cut and Paste
2. Background usage of audio streaming apps such as Pandora, Slacker, and FStream. If the iPod function can work in the background, there's no reason these other apps shouldn't be able to as well.
3. Record Phone calls. I could do this on my previous cell phone.
4. Video Record. Once again the camrea on my previous cell phone could do this and it wasn't even as good quality as the camera in the iPhone.
I live in center city philly (AT&T said they have tons of great towers here)...dropped call after dropped call. In 5 years of verizon..not a single dropped call on my end.
THe phone I had from AT&T? First the sent me a new sim card. Then they did the software update on my phone. Then sent me a replacement phone. Then sent me a newer generation of that phone. Then they let me out of my contract. Then they sent me a $250 fine for terminating my contract early. Then I had to fight (luckily i had a letter from them letting me out of my contract without a fine).
Unfortunately AT&T sucks in service in center city philly.
I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
Be careful, Mr. Murphy is ever the douchebag about enforcing his law. A friend of mine was doing consulting for AT&T wireless and the director of marketing offered him an Iphone as a "hey our service doesn't suck that bad, try this to prove it!" sort of thing. After numerous dropped calls outside NYC (a pretty much inexcusable place for ANY company not to have coverage), he uses it as nothing but a fancy PDA and switched back to using a junky clamshell phone from Verizon. It worked, but not enough to satisfy a can't-ever-miss-a-call consultant.
A2DP!! It only makes sense that we would want to use headphones with a portable music device.
The single biggest annoyance for me is the lack of a way to search my email. I use IMAP and have server-side filtering into folders, but I still need to search for stuff every once in a while.
I've worked around it by creating special folders like "Travel" so that I can quickly find itineraries and crap when I'm on the road, but that's kind of retarded. I'd much rather search for e.g. AXIOM in the sender field.
Oh, well.
A host is a host from coast to coast...
Unless it's down, or slow, or fails to POST!
please?
What should be added? The Abillity to automatically self destruct when the user's ego reaches a certain level.
I dont know wbout the iPhone, But for its phoneless cousin, Id like to see it retain its GPS and Microphone capabilities. There are tones of fantastic apps that dont work because they dont have the GPS antenna or audio mic that the iPhone version has. Also decent file transfer. I had to buy a wireless router and a third party app just to get non-itunes related files on my itouch. If they dont get some of this basic functionality, they are going to loose to Blackberry pretty fast
Common Sense isn't as Common as people think...
is it me? or does Bluetooth just suck? OK, its great for 2 things... wireless keyboards/mice & phone headsets (Its a narrow/slow data pipe & A2DP quality still doesn't approach wired fidelity... analogue wireless even sounds better). But on small portables, it eats battery life...
I can't believe the industry did something great by agreeing to standardize a technology... and then choose such a let down technology to standardize...
Can you imagine if Bluetooth had been as functionally successful as something like MIDI? Bluetooth has amounted to empty promises and dissatisfaction... yeah, works I guess... but it sucks. Don't hate the player, its not Apple's fault it sucks.
The Admin and the Engineer
Who cares about a user replaceable battery, when you can get an external battery pack of the same size as an extra battery? The only time you ever need more power is on a plane flight, otherwise extra batteries are too bulky to carry.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
and yet I get rated as a troll??
I always found the weakest part of the iPhones interface to be the lack of the Magical Pony to ride around while you laugh at the poor fools stuck with lesser phones.
Besides the universally lamented cut&paste, I'd love to have rules/filters in email so I can autosort incoming messages (particularily spam).
I'd also love the ability to have multiple email signatures, instead of one global email signature for all accounts.
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
You should check on that again. At least here in Canada, the vast majority of the music in the iTMS is now indeed DRM free. I believe their original target for 100% DRM free Music in iTMS was April 2009, so they still have a few weeks to go.
Yaz.
i'd like to have access to the GPS data from WebApps.
that way you don't have to rely on GeoIP data and relly could customize content and make WebApps location-aware.
maybe a whitelist of sites which have access to the data, or a popup asking for confirmation that the site can use the GPS coordinates...
This drives me crazy as well, and I'm almost certain that it didn't always do that.
how about offline maps?
with the nightmare costs of data, its so expensive to use the GPS, that there is no real point in having it in the first place.
and yes I am aware of the app for jail broken phones which does this. just would be nice not to have to jail break
--
next, what about some way to actually get the contents of the notes off the iPhone
I did not believe even apple would add something this dumb. whats the point of having the notes function if you can do nothing with it. who wants to take notes, only to have them inaccessible outside the iPhone.
on the same subject, why not allow notes to be emailed?
--
next, what about actually being able to read pdf and other files outside of mail?
without having to pay more $$$ for a third party app for this sort of thing, or using a free one, which is so limited as to be useless
--
why not let us use the iphone as a portable storage device? just like the (non touch) ipods do? and all without the need to jail break
yes the space is limited, but still nice to have the choice
--
finally, how about letting us compose SMS/Email in landscape mode?
this makes zero sense, why have something which can rotate when functions like mail and sms do not support it.
whats the problem apple? makes too much sense?
The iPhone can't disable the autolock? On the iPod Touch, it's under Settings -> General.
Local TV streaming to my phone.
I love my iphone apps. I'm an app-store and app sniper addict. I have more apps than even fit on the iPhone.I can deal with that... but the 9 page organization scheme HAS to go!
If there's one thing I would ask Apple for, it would be folders to organize my apps into, all accessible springboard style from the main page of apps.
Another thing I would love to see is customizable size icons. I would love to be able to view my apps in "list" view like OS X has in the finder.
I would also love to have a bigger "dock" portion of the screen to fit more frequently used applications.
I don't like that I can only have one ActiveSync-based account set up on my iPhone, even if I'm only using one for email and the other one for calendar only. I want BOTH my push email and my google calendar sync please!
Customizable alarm sounds and alerts!
Quick memory flush without having to restart!
for Steve Mobs to not pee on mine. As far as updates to the phone goes, that's about all I desire.
--- He advocated thrift and hard work and disapproved of loose women who turned him down. ---
If your friends tell you Apple is on the bleeding edge, it just means they just did not get it. Apple is about having a balanced product, which makes it lovable.
Unlike other phone makers (or mp3 makers) they don't believe in throwing in 4435 feats in their product to make the feature list on the back looks impressive, when only a handfull of them are really usable.
Apple will never sacrifice usability just to throw the latest gizmo in a device.
Write boring code, not shiny code!
I think you might be overestimating what's possible with a software update. ;)
YOU DARE to question the capabilities of Apple software updates?
For fsck's sake, give programmers the ability to access the data on the phone/ipod. It's ridiculous that there are dozens of music and DJ-related apps (and thus programmers interested in such capabilities) but none of them can do anything with the music library on the device itself. The piracy fear is ridiculous - it's no different than the risk of piracy on hard drives, DVDs, or any other storage device. There's no reason to cripple this device in this way; all it does is annoy users who would like to use the more advanced capabilities of these devices.
Admit it - you pussies have no balls to admit what you really use a hand-held screen for.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
While I was re-reading my own article, I was worried that I was throwing too many Blackberry references out there, which creates an opportunity to cloud the real issue. I don't suggest that the i-phone be just like a blackberry. Some people prefer a larger screen at the expense of a tactile keyboard, and all the other things that makes an i-phone an i-phone, and that's ok -- it depends on your personal usage and style. I don't have an iphone (my company issues them, but I looked carefully at the strengths and weaknesses and decided on a Bold instead) but we do own an ipod touch, and it's a really cool device with a cool interface.
It's not about making the i-phone the same as a blackberry. It's about keeping up with technology. Blackberry didn't invent stereo bluetooth, tethering with Macbooks, native DiVX support, micro-SD cards, or the micro-USB connector. They took advantage of those technologies to put out a more feature-rich phone, and -- this is the point -- they're not alone amongst Apple's competitors to do so. The Blackberry just happens to be the phone with which I have most recent experience. We could instead talk about the Treo, which had in the 1990's features the i-phone doesn't yet have.
When the i-phone first came out, it was a truly innovative GUI and packaging around... let's call it a collection of mature technology. Two factors have since changed -- "Mature" has progressed to "Elderly", and competitors are right on the edge of catching up on the packaging and GUI.
Apple has undeniably led the way, for some definitions of "way" -- my Bold probably wouldn't have had native wifi if they hadn't had to compete with the Jesus Phone, and for that I am thankful. There's a whole bunch (some would say too many) of new touch screen phones that wouldn't exist if the iphone had not. There's no denying that the i-phone has been insanely successful. My point is that there is danger in thinking your only competition is your own previous model. Palm made that mistake, and nearly vanished -- could, still. Microsoft made that mistake... and that story hasn't played out yet. Blackberry still has their own special hubris -- that it isn't mobile email if it doesn't go through a blackberry email server. Finally people are starting to code around that. (Web mail doesn't count.) Apple undeniably had a winner -- the question is, do they still?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
No one seems to be talking about the 300lb gorilla in the room, but video recording is a DEAL BREAKER. I have continued to use my blackjack for the past few years and refused to upgrade simply because the iPhone doesn't do video recording without jailbreaking. I got really excited when the G1 came out and... damn, no video recording. WTF?!?!?! How can these guys make these phones that are so close to being great and leave off such an obvious feature. I will wait with baited breath to see if Apple finally wakes up on this one, and if not, I will soon be the proud owner of a Storm, since RIM is the only company that seems to get it when it comes to mobile devices.
My software never has bugs.
It just develops random features.
My old Nokia 6310i did all of the above (SMS -> note was actually "move SMS to another folder"). Also, its battery, after 57 months of daily usage, would last about 6 days with medium-light usage. My iPhone sees a bit more usage, but it needs to be recharged every day.
Here ya go... Cut and paste
global search.
my palm had one. my nokias had one. why not the iphone?
the notepad as it exists on the device is useless if you have lots of notes as you have to manually search for what you are looking for. its a fucking computer. it should do the searching! it can hold 16gb of info but searching is manual?
an option to add a bluetooth keyboard would also be nice.
In my experience, bluetooth is mostly used for wireless accessories - like the keyboards/mice/microphones you mentioned. I don't usually find people using it, unless they have no choice, for anything else.
A calendar application that has revolutionary features such as the possibility to see the full week at once, or the possibilty to search for an event by entering its name.
These features were available on my Palm m100 about ten years ago!
In many ways, the iPhone's Mail program is the best mobile e-mail client out there.
I wasn't drinking anything, but I almost choked on my own saliva. I'd rather use alpine on my iphone than mail.app. I've managed to crash that thing plenty of times, and there's no searching, no gpg/pgp, no preventing it from attempting to open _everything_ in your mail folder including archived folders from years ago, yadda yadda.
I've jailbroken the phone. So I have copy/paste, turn-by-turn directions, tethering, (almost) full bluetooth stack, background applications (try backgrounding Pandora and browsing slashdot while in the car!), etc.
Frankly, I wish I didn't need to do that, but it was really easy. No complaints here.
(though I will admit that my RAZR was nice - A2DP, bluetooth modem, hci, ftp, usb modem - no hacking required!)
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
i don't want a Flash Player on my iPhone - just a waste of annoying blinking bandwidth wasters.
what we really need is a good text editor. there are several dozen note taking, doc-opening type utilities on the iphone - none of them are any good or even remotely useful (no - Text Guru doesn't even come close).
it was back in 1984 that MacWrite still couldn't swap its files to disk, and we were stuck with smaller than 32k text files. now, with the iphone -- its back to the future -- still cant open a basic text file (averages anywhere from 200k - 2Mb) -- i had this on my palm pilot back in 1998 with QED -- forget the friggin sharks with lasers on thier head -- all I want is a decent TEXT EDITOR.
Text Editor 1.0:
> Must Have:
- opens text files (must open files up to 2Mb in size)
- copy and paste between files
- both regular 'Finger Scroll' (drag text) AND 'Index Scroll' (drag edge for lengh of document)
- user can permanently set Background & Foreground Text Colours
- multi-file search and replace (i.e. search the content of all text files in a directory)
- user settable global font (set it once to MONACO 10, and never touch it!)
- every file must open at the same scroll and cursor location as when it was saved.
- ability to 'Bookmark' up to 256 scroll settings per text file
*even if it means adding a search string like  into the text.
> Should NOT Have:
- Should NOT Open IMAGES or Pictures
- Should NOT have FONTS / Sizes / Styles > NO RTF / Rich Text!!
- Should NOT Open PDF or Word Docs
if we can do software synths and video - why o why cant we even get a basic text editor!?!?
aaaarrrgggghhh!!!
2cents from toronto island
j
An electronic compass for the GPS that automatically orients the map in the right direction.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
yeah - USB mass storage support - is probably the best thing they could add (back) to the ipod.
This is what is really maddening to me.
I meet up with a long-lost friend or co-worker, and we're both standing there with iPhones, and there's no way to exchange contact info.
Basically it ends up looking like this: I open my contacts, hit "add new contact", and then pass my phone over to him, and he types in all his info.
Why can't I just hit a button to mail my contact info to him? That way, I only have to type in an email address. And if he emails me HIS contact info, why can't I just "select" the contact info (or have the iPhone simply recognize the info) and then hit a button that says "Add to contacts"?
Even copy/paste won't help too much on this one. There really just needs to be better dynamic contact sharing ability.
Another scenario: A friend of mine has contact info for a mutual friend. I currently have to laboriously copy it in. Why can't he just send it to me, and voila, it's in there? Like a text message, just ... boom, it's done?
Beyond that, I have all the standard requests: Copy-Paste, Event Notification framework, better way to organize apps, better landscape support, a way to 'lock' the screen to keep it from slipping into landscape when you are, for instance, using the iphone while lying down, MMS support, tethering support, flash support in Safari, video support (and frankly, i'd like the video player stripped out from teh iPod button, and treated more like the 'photos' button, with the 'camera roll' equivalent for video right at the top, and then better categorization and organization of videos below), options for editing the typing dictionary, mark-all-as-read in email, ability to use maps without a connection (cached image), ability to turn-off or hide pre-installed apps taht you never use (like 'stocks')...
And one I'd like personally, the ability to send an option to add a confirmation before it calls a number you've touched. I can't count the number of times I've accidentally called someone and had to scramble for the 'end call' button before the person on the other end got the ring... ugh.
- Spryguy
There are three kinds of people in this world: those that can count and those that can't
... that's the thing that I can't believe they haven't implemented. That was one of the coolest things about the old Palm OS, a common database format that was easily discoverable to let developers integrate with each other almost promiscuously...
Cut and paste, yes, but that's only the beginning.
I'm a Kraut. If I want to enter an umlaut I have to press the corresponding vowel and wait for about 2 seconds until a bubble pops up where I can select my favorite umlaut. I hate these two seconds.
What I would suggest: allow people to bring up this bubble by a small gesture, e.g tap the character and then slide down.
By the way: slashdot seems to be umlaut-challenged, too.
how about a little database of things you frequently want to paste in to web forms such as your last name, your email address, your phone number. In addition of course to copy and paste. And for the love of god, allow me to send and receive pictures in SMS messages like all the other phones out there that cost $200 less than mine can do.
Speaking of proprietary cables, it's time Apple take a clue from the rest of the cell phone industry and switch to a micro-USB connector on the phone. Last time I said that in this forum, someone replied that Apple has been providing USB support for some time, which just goes to show how misunderstood this issue is. All three of our phones, and the company phone when I have to carry it, will charge from the same charger despite being different manufacturers. The ipod touch needs that proprietary stylish white charger with the stylish white proprietary connector. Where the hell has that thing gone now... Apple, please hear this. Proprietary data connectors are so last century.
I can connect to any standard USB charger. And of course connect to any number of useful external peripherals that make use of the base connector you dislike. It's a cable you have to carry either way.
No, it's two cables he has to carry versus one cable. The iphone cable may be USB on one side, but it's proprietary on the other.
try htc touch hd. it has got everything you want. in fact, the device is so good, it leaves iphone far behind.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
I mean what's the point of leaving that out ? ...
You get an SMS invite to a gig, you want to pass it along
Have iPhone, RETYPE IT
It's not about making the i-phone the same as a blackberry. It's about keeping up with technology. Blackberry didn't invent stereo bluetooth, tethering with Macbooks, native DiVX support, micro-SD cards, or the micro-USB connector.
But that's not necessarily "keeping up with technology". That's choosing weather or not to abandon certain aspects that past phones have used. As noted, leaving out SD support is a valid choice because it keeps the phone smaller. Choosing to not support bluetooth stereo keeps battery life longer. Supporting fewer video formats again is a choice driven by longer battery life (and thus smaller device size) by allowing the codecs that are supported hardware acceleration. Not supporting micro-USB does nothing to harm the user since you can still recharge with any USB port, and you get added functionality from the dock connector with a huge range of devices already built for the iPhone.
As for tethering, that's an AT&T issue - there was a tethering app, but Apple had it pulled at the request of AT&T. Until AT&T works out how they want to charge for iPhone tethering it's not really an Apple technical issue. Those that were lucky enough to purchase the app before are in fact tethering today...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
No, it's two cables he has to carry versus one cable. The iphone cable may be USB on one side, but it's proprietary on the other.
Let's play "Count the cable(s)"!
Scenario one - I have a phone with a miniUSB port. To charge it, I carry a cable that is USB on one end and miniUSB on the other.
Count, one!
Secenario two - I have an iPhone, and USB to iPhone cable that comes with the phone. To charge it, I attach that cable to any USB port.
Count, one!
So how does 1 = 2? For either phone you have to carry a cable to charge it. You only have to carry one cable if you expect to find a USB port anywhere (like if you are traveling with a laptop).
The scenarios are identical, you take one cable with you.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You aren't imagining it--iPhone 2.0 brought this wonderful feature :-(
Apparently people complained about missing text messages, and Apple's solution was to give you two--with no option to opt out. Great. I just don't get how you go to two without an option to stay at one. Sigh.
"Doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs." -- Switchfoot, Ode to Chin
- How about Java ME that 95% of the other phones already supports, and so that I finally run programs developed at my company.
- Flash so that I could browse the web.
- Stop forcing developers to upload applications to appstore and to pay fees for a account and SDK.
Well, according to this list, it's about the functionality that they'll add in the next version ;)
I was going to joke about copy/paste, only to see that they're seriously having to ask for it (and what happened to "But we don't need primitive features like copy/paste, because Apple does it in some new manner, although I can't tell you how"?) In fact, I note that my years old cheap non-smart Motorola V980 has 5 of the "features" on this list (I don't even consider them features, just standard functionality). I had no idea that you couldn't even use the Iphone as an Internet connection for computer.
I'm wondering why this is news at all. Most new phones don't get a Slashdot story at all - even from major players - let alone a story about a mere wish list before a product's even released.
But that's part of Apple's brilliant marketing: the fact that the Iphone misses basic bog standard features itself gets them free advertising, because you have everyone requesting the features, and then queuing up desperately to get hold of the new phone when it's finally released, years behind the competition (as happened with the Iphone 3G).
Let's start a thread here - What Features Should Be Included With The Next Phone From Motorola Or Nokia?
This will be a much more interesting discussion, since we don't need to fill the list with basic features that other cheap phones have had for years - we can discussing interesting new possibilities that people would like to see? Let's hear an idea that's more innovative that "custom ringtones for my voicemail"(!)
Why in god's name won't they make an iPhone with either no camera or failing that, a removable camera? There's a statistically significant number of us out there who can't bring cameras into our workplaces. There's a company that will remove the camera for $100, but I can't stomach the idea of paying somebody to rip out a feature I don't want anyway.
I seen it. A friend has one. Touch screen and slide-out keyboard. A little on the thick side, but chock full of features.
It runs Windows Mobile 6. He (my friend) has had better stability than most, because with the exception of turn-by-turn instructions, he has no 3rd party software installed that might affect reliability. He sometimes goes a whole day without having to reboot his phone, and it will reliably receive calls, say, 17 times out of 20. Pretty good for Windows Mobile.
But, you see, I'm not just looking for features. There used to be this concept called "dial-tone reliability", which means no matter what, even in pitch dark, you'll still get a dial tone, and your call has a very high likelihood of going through. This was back in the days of land lines, maybe you don't remember.
What Windows Mobile brings to the table is "PC reliability". A phone as reliable as your average desktop computer. I'm sorry, that doesn't work for me. Maybe I'm old-fashioned. Perhaps my standards are too high.
Before I get another Windows Mobile device, I'd get an i-phone 3G and just leave it on Edge.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/161284/digg_founder_offers_sneak_peek_of_iphone_30_copypaste_feature.html
Can't wait for the next-gen hardware upgrade (fingers crossed for 32gb). I'll finally be able to replace my crappy phone and iPod Nano with an iPhone (just a mediocre phone, but that's fine by me).
If it were truly compatible with Microsoft Exchange, it would be far more buggy, insecure, and crash-prone than it is.
Apple will never sacrifice usability just to throw the latest gizmo in a device.
I'm not so sure I would describe such basic things as the ability to find a network signal or having functional bluetooth as the latest gizmo. Apple's computers, whatever else we may think about them, fill their niche so well at least partly because they are a fully functional product. Seems to me there are just too many things they couldn't be bothered implementing on their phone in their haste to get it on the market.
The next offering is going to have to be more carefully thought through if Apple wants to maintain any kind of edge. People were prepared to forgive the iPhone's quirks when it was new. Now it's had time to mature and is no longer so new and shiny, people will expect a more mature product.
handkerchief so you can wipe Steve Jobs fecal matter off of your nose.
Most of these have features already been implemented in jailbroken phones, but it would be nice to have these features without having to void your warranty.
I love my iPhone and even when using it w/bluetoothe or earbuds it is still damn dangerous to drive with the thing because you MUST look at the stupid screen to dial it. Even my ancient Nokia had voice dialing! Only a few key numbers, but it worked well.
Cut and fucking paste already GOD DAMMIT! Go ahead, try an type in a 30 or 40 digit wireless access code!
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
- wireless sync
..... gee there are way too many and people above have covered it all.... and those features should have made it to 2.0
- easy tethering
- horiz keyboard everywhere
- background apps
- SMS/Calls blacklist
- Send Contact by SMS
- Copy + Paste
- Flash
That's right. Usability is the standard. Everyone can say whatever they want, but Apple is making huge profits with no real competition, because all the other hardware/software makers are still competing with eachother for more and more "features" hidden behind countless amounts of sub-menu's.
this is htc touch pro what you have seen. touch hd hasn't got a keyboard. it is the same size as iphone, but has got a 800x480 display.
windows mobile isn't as bad as you have seen. if a device crashes often, chances are that the device is broken. pretty much everyone in my family has got a windows mobile pda phone (because of the features) and they have to reboot maybe once in a month or so. no problems with calling or receiving calls whatsoever.
my own one crashes every three days or so, but only because it is a wm5 phone flashed with a beta wm6.1. i can live with that because the device is so useful. i can live with pc reliability because it comes together with pc functionality. if i were only interested in making calls, i would rather buy an old nokia 8210 which i'd have to recharge only every two weeks or so.
btw don't talk to me about dial tone reability, i was born and raised in the ussr. every windows mobile phone is more reliable than a soviet land line.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
RTFM! You don't have to reach in your pocket if you use the included headphones you can switch tracks by double pinching the mic/button assembly. Single pinching starts and stops play, and triple pinching sends it back a track.
- How about showing the number of characters when typing a SMS (36/200, 37/200, etc) ?
- How about showing an icon saying "incoming" or "outgoing" in front of each call in the phone log ? (Without having to click the arrow to see the details).
These things exist for years on other phones...
You can add many other things to this list:
- Having more than one camera roll to store all the photos, manageable from the phone.
- A direct "new tab" button in the bottom bar in Safari.
- Enabling developpers to use TvOut for all the applications (games displaying on your TV !).
- Etc...
-- Rastignac was here.
http://pleasefixtheiphone.com/
MMS, for crissakes! :-) They've ignored that for a long time.
I agree with another poster here, the Google Maps feature is completely useless for traveling. Too slow, not enough detail, kludgy.
I'd like to cut-and-paste from SMS so I can "separately" send similar comments to people.
i'd like a more logical interface that does what should happen when i do X instead of what they think it should do. When i click a phone number DON'T DIAL IT! i'll tell *you* when to dial you fucker! Also, don't make synchronizing delete my apps. Let me use iTunes at work and at home without destroying my apps and downloads. Let me load music into the damn thing. There's a button that says iPod for some reason it refuses to let me load music. Make it a drag and drop folder interface, you know, like every other fracking mp3 player.
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
Complete cleaving the tether to a local machine: permit downloading files (txt, pdf, etc.) while browsing and allow access to them between apps (e.g, safari, mail, Annotater, who's going to write vi?).
> btw don't talk to me about dial tone reability, i was born and raised in the ussr. every windows mobile phone is more reliable than a soviet land line.
Welcome to the US. Fair enough. It's all about expectations.
There are three people in my department who had company-issued windows mobile devices, including me. Two Treos and one HTC. We returned the Treos after a couple months because they (both of them) wouldn't go a full day without rebooting, and they had a tendency to not ring on the next incoming call if you'd previously run any application that used the sound driver. The forums would say something about not releasing the driver when the phone needed it -- I never figured out what it was, didn't care, got rid of it. The one person in our department who still has a Windows Mobile phone hangs onto it grimly because he likes the (HTC) hardware.
My daughter has had a Blackberry Curve for the last 15 months. She's a teenager and a geek, and is very hard on the phone, both physically and software. (Software-ly?) She's always installing and uninstalling third-party stuff and almost every feature is under regular use. During that 15 months, the phone has rebooted exactly once, last December when we replaced the battery. That's what I look for in a phone/PDA, and is why my next phone was a Blackberry.
In all fairness, since this is an Apple thread, she's also very hard on her iPod Touch. I allow her free reign to download any free application from the app store, but I monitor her account to see what's on the phone. I think she's downloaded every freakin' third party app you could get for free, and (with permission) quite a few 99 cent apps. The Touch has never, as in, never ever, hung, crashed or spontaneously rebooted. That's what I look for in an appliance. The iPhone and iPod Touch are fundamentally robust, as in, robust in their core operating system, an area in which Microsoft would have to spend too much money (completely re-writing a lot of their code) to compete. (And an area where no gui overlay can help.)
But again, it's all about expectations. If PC-level reliability is good enough for you, then more power to you. That certainly gives you a wider range of hardware to choose from. For the rest of us, there's Symbian, RIM and Apple. (And potentially Android, but it's too early to tell.)
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Woah, New Math! Let's say, as in the original example, that I own (stay with me, this is a stretch...) more than one electronic device, (hard to believe, huh?) and they're not all made by Apple.
Lost me there, since there's a limited subset of things for which your single cable scenario would work - you ask me to presuppose you own a few non-Apple devices as well, but then you ask be to believe that every single one of these devices uses the same mini USB for changing. It's not impossible, but increasingly unlikely as the device count rises - and at the core of things, a big reason to have an iPhone is to replace those multitude of devices. In which case, we are back to one cable...
Furthermore, if you have a family your children are statistically likely to have an iPod variant. By taking the mini-USB path, you are in fact increasing your cable count to two when you could have had just one.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I have two phones (two HTC devices) and an external harddrive. They all use miniUSB. How many cables do I need?
Two at least, because you'll want to be able to charge something at the same time as you are using the USB drive. I know, because I've travelled with similar sets of devices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
ah yes, treo. they are really bad (made by htc but designed by palm who never got the hang of multitasking). such a thing with sound never happened on any of my htc devices and i owned a lot (wallaby, himalaya, blue angel, three universals...).
anyway, i tried the iphone. i really wanted to like it, but all the time i had the feeling that the phone was severely castrated by design. i was used to real multitasking, copy&paste, a2dp and bluetooth data transfer of windows mobile, so using the iphone was for me a huge step backwards to palm os and alike. also i prefer to have the possibility to use stylus and to use the touchscreen with gloves on when it's cold outside.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
It's definitely you. Bluetooth may not work well with all the things people try to do with it, but the use cases where it is useful are pretty common. Do I need to point out all the bluetooth borgs you see on the street? Not to mention wireless keyboards and mice you can use without a dongle, being able to sync your phone without finding a USB cable...
You *need* a stylus to poke Start -> Programs -> Accessories (...) on that tiny screen. It's an exercise in fine motor control. It's a fine paradigm for a PC, but a poor paradigm for a phone.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
I just bought an I phone with an Sim Onlycontract and some mobile internet on it. Works fine! Can't wait for Iphone updates!